The Great Cable and Interconnect Swindle: An Etiology

[barrows]

So, only a few million doesn't count anymore? Don't be ridiculous.

 

Els: please let me know the cable maker (individual) who is bringing home a few million a year? In any case, no, a cable maker making a living does not bother me relative to the real economic problems which are faced here in America, with a stock market and so called "banking" firms allowed to run amock and vampirically suck huge amounts of capitol out of the real economy, to fill their own coffers with obscene amounts of money. A couple of folks making a few cables, just not a big deal in the scheme of things, and hey, we might even get some better sound out of it.

Additionally, we must remember, that no one is forced to purchase expensive cables, (unlike going to the dentist, or getting reamed, indirectly, through the activities of unscrupulous "bankers"), so the suggestion that there is "swindling" going on just does not cut it.

[chg]

Even if they believe in what they are doing, they know the parts cost of their products. Taking a reasonable profit for knowledge, manufacture etc is fine. The kinds of profits these cable makers enjoy are obscene, ethically disgusting, and they cannot fail to know what their profit margins are. I would be tremendously ashamed to offer products with profit margins they have. I simply could not sleep were I to do what they do.

 

Call in the profit police!

 

Reasonable profit??? Heard of the free market and supply and demand?

 

Instead of get all upset over it, you can choose not to buy them. Just a suggestion.

 

Your energies are better directed at the Fed.

[Jud]

It appears that the cable debate simply moved to a new thread.

 

elsdude- Why do you insist on continually presenting your opinions as fact. The fact is, you don't know whether cables sound different, or not. If it were fact, then there would be no debate. Please present your factual, definitive evidence, or stop the attacks.

 

Actually, Dennis has subjectively experienced differences in sound, but hasn't been able to obtain any test results that would substantiate differences. He has performed numerous tests, and has been very good about "taking requests" for various types of testing. He's been brave enough to assume his subjective preferences could be fooling him. So I think the stated basis of your criticism is mis-aimed.

 

I'm quite interested in seeing some sort of verification of the statements about the contents of the MIT and Transparent "black boxes." If the allegations are true, those sorts of out and out fabrications would lay open MIT and Transparent to having their businesses ended and the revenues confiscated partially or entirely by any state attorney general, or federal authorities, or by any customer who felt like bringing a class action.

 

As an attorney, I can't see any reason why they would make affirmative false statements about what's in the boxes (as in the MIT YouTube video I linked to showing circuit boards installed inside MIT's boxes) and thus expose themselves to these potentially disastrous consequences, instead of simply saying nothing and thus having nothing to answer for.

[chg]

Actually, Dennis has subjectively experienced differences in sound, but hasn't been able to obtain any test results that would substantiate differences. He has performed numerous tests, and has been very good about "taking requests" for various types of testing. He's been brave enough to assume his subjective preferences could be fooling him. So I think the stated basis of your criticism is mis-aimed.

 

I don't think I'm wrong in stating that he (and others) uses definitive words/statements instead of saying, in my opinion(s).

 

I have no problem with people sharing their "opinions".

[RobbieC]

Very philosophical all this talk.

[barrows]

Jud:

 

I can confirm that MIT cables' boxes contain circuits. Specifically they contain networks, usually RC based (resitor-capacitor) but some of their more sophisticated models also include inductors as part of the circuit. These networks can act as filters, and dampers of both cable, and amplifier resonances. As you go up the MIT line, the circuits get more complicated (the number of filters increases, a low end cable might have one R-C network, higher end ones ahve many at different values).

Spectral specs these cables because the networks act as damping, to keep the very high bandwidth output of the amplifier form oscillating out of control.

In any case, the parts used are not expensive per se, but of course, they do add additional expense which cables without any networks do not share, and additional R & D costs to tune and test the networks to make them viable for many component/speaker combinations.

 

I do not know about Transparent, but I suspect they are doing something similar. But with the exception of some specific components, I have a hard time believing a one size fits all network is going to be an advantage for all combinations of amplifiers and speakers: typically a circuit like this will have to be tuned just right for the combination of amplifier and speakers, if it is not, it is just as likely to cause harmful resonances as it is to damp them...

 

BTW, Walker Audio "High Definition Links" are the same thing, just an RC network one adds across the speaker terminals-these are easy to DIY and try oneself for little expense. There are instructions available on the net, (google). A typical set of values would be a .01 uF film cap with a 10 ohm resistor. One would typically use a decent film cap here, and a 1 watt resistor is totally adequate.

[prufrock]

Take it easy folks. The title is a necessary evil I'm afraid. I will be stated early on that this is not a swindle in the usual sense of the word. Nothing libelous being thrown around.

In general nobody is deliberately trying to fool anybody in audiophile land. And its no big deal anyhow if a sect of balding middle aged men want to sit around in tubelit surroundings playing with their cables. Although I don't believe that there would be a mother around who say that this is altogether "healthy" activity. I am sure Dame Edna would agree.

[sandyk]

"Although I don't believe that there would be a mother around who say that this is altogether "healthy" activity. I am sure Dame Edna would agree. "

 

I don't believe that there would be a mother around who would say that a young married man flirting with a horny single female (? ) on line would be an altogether "healthy" activity either. I feel sure that Barry Humphreys would agree too. ( evil grin)

It could be much safer playing with cables ?

[Julf]

So what we have here is a blog where flat earth folks can congregate, and make themselves feel better in their ignorance, laughable.

 

And what are the odds that they are allowed to do that without the threads getting clogged up with people ridiculing them?

 

Even more amusing is that it is quite simple to test whether an audiophile cable actually improves performance, as The Cable Company maintains a rather extensive library of lending cables, which can be tested in one's system for very little cost. Additionally, many good dealers will allow for at home cable demos. The intellectual "excersize" of once again describing how cables "could not possibly make a difference" is moot considering the extensive evidence to the contrary.

 

I suggest another test that can be done easily - and provides answers that can be verified beyond individual listening rooms. What we need is someone who has a high-quality, high-res ADC/sound card to record the output of a good DAC playing a piece of music - and record it twice, once using a cheap, generic cable and once using a fancy, audiophile cable. Better yet, record the piece three times - picking one of the two cables randomly for the third recording. Then make all three recordings available online, and let CA members do a blind ABX. Do this with enough people and multiple music samples, and you should get a pretty reliable result. But what would we then argue about?

[prufrock]

I think it is fair to say that there may have been some rigorous potty training happening in the past in many cases. Once again I think the Dame would agree that there is a certain amount of fixation at the anal stage going on.

[Julf]

In general nobody is deliberately trying to fool anybody in audiophile land.

 

I hope you are right. But I do find that Mark Twain's old "It's easier to fool people than to convince them they have been fooled" is all too appropriate in the audiophile world.

[prufrock]

And what are the odds that they are allowed to do that without the threads getting clogged up with people ridiculing them?

 

 

 

I suggest another test that can be done easily - and provides answers that can be verified beyond individual listening rooms. What we need is someone who has a high-quality, high-res ADC/sound card to record the output of a good DAC playing a piece of music - and record it twice, once using a cheap, generic cable and once using a fancy, audiophile cable. Better yet, record the piece three times - picking one of the two cables randomly for the third recording. Then make all three recordings available online, and let CA members do a blind ABX. Do this with enough people and multiple music samples, and you should get a pretty reliable result. But what would we then argue about?

 

Seeing the other camp have come along anyway, what do you think of the suggestion above? Do you believe it would provide anything worthwhile in the great cable debate if it could be organised?

[sandyk]

"Once again I think the Dame would agree that there is a certain amount of fixation at the anal stage going on. "

 

I think the Dame may be too busy trying to lose weight with Jenny Craig, than worrying about potty training and other things anal. (wink!)

[prufrock]

 

Dame Edna is an Australian national treasure. And you are all her possums.

[prufrock]

[mayhem13]

Jud:

 

These networks can act as filters, and dampers of both cable, and amplifier resonances.

Spectral specs these cables because the networks act as damping, to keep the very high bandwidth output of the amplifier form oscillating out of control.

 

I don't who should be more ashamed here, the cable mfgr for making these statements or you for quoting them. "Damping cable resonance?".........Oscillating out of control?...are we talking cables or Doomsday prophecies? Seriously, if your intention is to defend cable mfgrs, stop posting this crap!

[esldude]

It appears that the cable debate simply moved to a new thread.

 

elsdude- Why do you insist on continually presenting your opinions as fact. The fact is, you don't know whether cables sound different, or not. If it were fact, then there would be no debate. Please present your factual, definitive evidence, or stop the attacks.

 

Read my null testing thread. Their is not a difference that is audible between the interconnects I tested interconnects. That is a fact. I am not the only one who has done such things. I can provide them if you wish. One I have linked to is an MIT grad student measuring audio performance of cables for his thesis. He found nothing to explain how they could sound different. In other words, my opinion has been informed by facts.

[esldude]

Yeah, to those who think I am implying MIT cables have nothing in the boxes I am not. Early on some may have had nothing in one end. Even when they had something it wasn't much. And yes some now have quite a bit in the boxes. There is even some DIY threads where they show you have to make similar boxes for your own making of your own cables.

 

However, their top speaker cable with "80 poles" is $29,999 for an 8 foot pair. Maybe I am wrong, maybe the parts cost is appropriate. I also know it is typical in smaller production for parts cost to be about 10% of what something sells for as there is also labor costs, other overhead, advertising etc. A company making a 10% profit after expenses and having 10% of sales cost be in parts is not at all unreasonable. I just wonder if a $30K 8 foot pair of cables with two or four little boxes of caps, resisters and inductors have $3000 parts cost. Seems unlikely there is more parts cost in passive parts in a cable than say active components.

 

Maybe Bruce Brisson has been more forthcoming I haven't looked for extremely recent information. Early on his explanation of articulation poles was vague and non-specific. Sounded like the typical spiel that attempts to sound technical and advanced yet there never was enough told about what this articulation measurement is exactly. If it were true and most cables does miserably at it why not show precisely what it is? Two possible reasons come to mind. One is that it is misdirection to justify their products. Another is it is proprietary knowledge and he doesn't want other people to know it so they could make their own equally good cables.

 

If anyone can point to where he really describes what he measures I would take a look at it.

[esldude]

I don't who should be more ashamed here, the cable mfgr for making these statements or you for quoting them. "Damping cable resonance?".........Oscillating out of control?...are we talking cables or Doomsday prophecies? Seriously, if your intention is to defend cable mfgrs, stop posting this crap!

 

 

You know I am not one defending cable makers sometimes goofy explanations. I have owned some Spectral gear, and while it doesn't seem an extremely common problem, their equipment is very wide bandwidth. Most of it near a megahertz and some 2 megahertz. Some cabling or speaker loads could let it oscillate if ultrasonic garbage got into the system. MIT with what I would call a restricted bandwidth cable would roll off things so that didn't happen.

 

One example I had a Meridian DAC that had a steady 1.1 megahertz idle tone. Used with more restricted bandwidth pre-amps or with a passive volume control it was fine. With 1/2 meter interconnects directly connected to the amp that idle tone would eat up some of the power as the amp could and did amplify that. It didn't go into oscillation and the tone wasn't high enough to continually clip the amp. But it altered the sound apparently through some intermodulation garbage. That one was a tricky one to track down. Had I used MIT cable it wouldn't have happened.

[Paul R]

Take it easy folks. The title is a necessary evil I'm afraid. I will be stated early on that this is not a swindle in the usual sense of the word. Nothing libelous being thrown around.

In general nobody is deliberately trying to fool anybody in audiophile land. And its no big deal anyhow if a sect of balding middle aged men want to sit around in tubelit surroundings playing with their cables. Although I don't believe that there would be a mother around who say that this is altogether "healthy" activity. I am sure Dame Edna would agree.

 

Ah- I see. You wish to have free reign to ridicule people without being challenged.

 

Pretty much not going to happen.

 

That is an old European Authoritarian technique used to immediately cause self doubt and conflict in people with opposing opinions - it presents an unsane dichotomy.

 

Authoritarian repression at its European best.

 

Tell the dear peepul exactly what is best for them because they are not smart enough to be able to figure it out for themselves.

 

The popular way of saying that over here is "If you cannot dazzle them with your brilliance, baffle them with your bullshit..."

 

Moreover, you have the unmitigated gall to classify anyone who disagrees with you as:

a sect of balding middle aged men want to sit around in tubelit surroundings playing with their cables.

 

That is plain insulting, and yet another old European Authoritarian method of swindling people. Paint a picture of those who oppose you with an unflattering, slightly disgusting, perhaps slightly creepy picture, and paint yourself as the shining knight coming to rescue the great unwashed masses.

 

Unfortunately, when you employ such tactics and call them a "necessary evil" you forfeit any claim to free speech or any right to spread your opinion in such a manner without challenge.

 

Nobody has the right to ridicule other pople without being challenged on it- no matter how right they might think they are, or how noble they believe their purpose to be. Usually it turns out they are neither, by the way.

 

If you want to see how to present your opinions the right way, look at ESLDUDE and MITCHCO. Both of them have posted really thought provoking and challenging thinking about the same subject, and garnered almost universal respect, though not always agreement. And they have consistently done so without the use of any such "necessary evil" as you say you feel compelled to emoy.

 

They put a lot of work into it too. There are no shortcuts.

 

Paul

[prufrock]

Gee, talk about gatecrashing a persons thread. All I wanted was a little quiet time in skeptics corner with listeners who hold a similar view on this particular subject.

 

Still no response to this suggestion of Julf's though:

 

"I suggest another test that can be done easily - and provides answers that can be verified beyond individual listening rooms. What we need is someone who has a high-quality, high-res ADC/sound card to record the output of a good DAC playing a piece of music - and record it twice, once using a cheap, generic cable and once using a fancy, audiophile cable. Better yet, record the piece three times - picking one of the two cables randomly for the third recording. Then make all three recordings available online, and let CA members do a blind ABX. Do this with enough people and multiple music samples, and you should get a pretty reliable result."

 

What do you reckon?

[Jud]

I think it's fine that prufrock would like to provide a thread and blog to collect ideas and information supporting the notion that there will be no audible differences between well constructed cables. (If I've got that wrong, prufrock, please correct me.). It's a big forum, and IMO these folks should feel free to have a discussion without "interruptions," so to speak.

 

Meanwhile, though, I think for the sake of the quality of the discussion, folks may want to desist from mere rumor-spreading ("These boxes have nothing in them, according to what some other guy said that Peter Aczel wrote!").

[esldude]

I started such a poll on one musical selection which had gone through an DA/AD stage with cheap and good interconnect.

 

In the end, there were problems with some of my set up which goldsdad caught and pointed out. I have now corrected that and could do it again.

 

But it didn't appear we would receive too many taking part in the poll. Even though anonymous, I received about as many direct responses from those not wanting to use the poll as those who voted. Plus people didn't like the two choice variety of testing I used. I suppose a 3 choice version like Julf proposed would find more acceptance though analyzing the statistics of that are messier. But I haven't been motivated to attempt that again.

[esldude]

Don't want to turn this into a different topic. But in terms of fair play and hearing the other side of the story here is an interview where Bruce Brisson describes what MIT cable does and a bit more about what is articulation measures are though I note he won't quite answer all the questions put to him.

 

The Bruce Brisson Interview: on Music Interface Technologies Cables' Oracle Series, MA Series and Z Powerbar, Part 1 of 2 - The Columns - Dagogo

 

The Bruce Brisson Interview: on Music Interface Technologies Cables' Oracle Series, MA Series and Z Powerbar, Part 2 of 2 - The Columns - Dagogo

 

Also how you can use the same idea to make your own interface boxes.

 

6moons audio reviews: Bruce Brisson's DIY Giant Killer Project

 

And finally some measurements of stuff by MIT with explanations in a white paper.

 

http://ww2.mitcables.com/pdf/wp101.pdf

[barrows]

mayhem: Apparently, you know little of amplifiers, cables, and speakers. Amplifier oscillation is a real, electrical, problem with some cable/speaker combinations-the amplifier output stage-cable-and speaker creates a circuit, and some combinations thereof can make an amplifier unstable (oscillation). This is not some audiophile myth. Many amplifiers have zobel networks across their outputs in an attempt to keep them stable even under very different load conditions ( a zobel is an RC network, like what we have in MIT cables). I am not an EE, but I am sure Julf can confirm.

 

In no way am I recommending MIT cables, I am just pointing out that their "boxes" do have real circuitry inside, and the nature of that circuitry is grounded in sound electronic principles. Whether or not this makes the cables sound better in a given system is up to you to decide, as stated, I personally think it is wrong to expect a one size fits all network tuning to work for many different amplifier/speaker combinations-or to be necessary for a properly designed amplifier/speaker combination.

 

"I suggest another test that can be done easily - and provides answers that can be verified beyond individual listening rooms. What we need is someone who has a high-quality, high-res ADC/sound card to record the output of a good DAC playing a piece of music - and record it twice, once using a cheap, generic cable and once using a fancy, audiophile cable. Better yet, record the piece three times - picking one of the two cables randomly for the third recording. Then make all three recordings available online, and let CA members do a blind ABX. Do this with enough people and multiple music samples, and you should get a pretty reliable result. But what would we then argue about?"

 

I have no interest in doing this kind of test, as it can only prove if their is a measureable difference, it cannot prove if their is a significant sonic difference that is not measurable by this test. Additionally, a sound card is woefully inadequate for testing high end audio systems, an AP2 is needed, and few folks have access to this equipment. And, in any case, what matters is what the system sounds like. Ultimately, we are going to enjoy our systems by listening to music, and that means system changes should be evaluated by listening to music. If one hears a difference, then that difference is relevant to that listener on that system, it is as simple as that. There is no need to "prove" anything any further than that. This is why I suggest that people listen for themselves, and, if you do not trust what you hear, then there is no reason for you to pursue high end audio reproduction anyway, get another hobby.